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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23235589">Catch and Release</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Allatariel/pseuds/Allatariel'>Allatariel</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Last of the Mohicans (1992)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>F/M, Missing Scene</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-03-20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-03-20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-01 13:22:01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>813</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23235589</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Allatariel/pseuds/Allatariel</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>On the way to the fort, Alice is caught up in the beauty of the wilderness. Uncas helps to release her from its hold.</p><p>
  <em>Alice is still wearing her little linen cap after the ambush on the road, but it is gone once they reach the river. This is my explanation of what might have happened to it.</em>
</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Alice Munro/Uncas</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>6</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>52</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Catch and Release</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Comments and constructive criticism always more than welcomed and so greatly appreciated! Any advice on tagging would be amazing.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Chingachgook and Nathaniel led the way out onto the wide rock bank of the swiftly running river, with Cora and Major Heyward following a dozen or so paces behind. Cora had left Alice's side a short while ago to speak with Duncan, and the younger Munro sister had intentionally fallen farther behind so as to offer them some privacy. Uncas had likewise slowed his pace to maintain his position as rearguard some twenty paces behind her, keeping an eye to the forest behind them and another to the young woman ahead of him.</p><p>Upon taking in her first sight of the river, Alice stopped walking altogether, awed by its crystalline beauty. Its flowing waters glistered in the summer sunlight as it rushed over its mostly smooth rock bed, whipping itself into white tufts spraying diamond droplets whenever it met the odd irregularity or boulder midstream. The riverbed cut a wide swath through the dense forest—Alice could see where the edge of the trees ended sharply and met with the exposed stone bank where even now their two guides, followed by Cora and Duncan continued on at a steady pace.</p><p>Not wanting to fall any farther behind, Alice started forward slowly, but stopped short again after only a few steps. Before she could stop herself, she gasped aloud to feel it: a sudden, restraining tug against the whitework-embroidered linen cap pinned into her hair. Alice held her head still as she removed her leather riding gloves and bundled them into her pockets.  She felt along her crown, gingerly searching for what she presumed to be a small branch caught somehow in the cap—and indeed, her fingers soon brushed against the rough bark of a delicate, tethering limb. Sighing, she set about disentangling herself from the restraint.</p><p>Nearly a minute passed as she vainly struggled to free herself. Alice was verging on sighing again in frustration when warm, deft fingers gently but insistently moved through hers to extricate her from the snare. Focused on her efforts to free herself, she had not noticed the approach of their third and youngest guide. Now, instead of sighing, she gasped again softly, not in surprise or fear, but at the feeling of his skin against hers—and at the warmth it brought to her cheeks and the thrill it sent to her belly. Reluctantly, she pulled her hands out of his way, holding them loosely against her diaphragm, one atop the other. Alice felt the young Indian remove the few pins securing the little cap to her hair, their ends gently scratching her scalp and sending faint chills through her despite the early August heat. All too quickly Alice felt the cap come free—his hands leaving her hair with it—though she could have sworn his fingers lingered a moment against the strands that had slipped free with the pins to fall softly around her face.</p><p>Alice turned towards him as he moved to face her. She watched him proceed to gently fold the linen and hold it and the pins out to her. Reaching out to receive the items, she felt his fingers linger against the heel of her upturned hand. Her own small fingers curled gently against his palm, the linen cap and pins held between them. In unspoken unison, they each looked down at their hands folded thus together—a study in complimentary contrast. Suddenly, Alice thought of the handfasting of her cousin that she had witnessed early in her sixth year, before the Forty-Five and its aftermath had taken her mother and all traces of her former Highland life from her.</p><p>Even as their hands fell away hesitantly, the points where they had touched still warmed by the contact, and they raised their eyes to each other’s, each unable to prevent their mouths from bearing the faintest hint of a smile. Alice felt her cheeks blooming freshly into a deeper flush, and she ducked her head in a gesture of thanks. He nodded in acknowledgement, his warm eyes taking in her soft expression as she pushed the fabric up her sleeve like a handkerchief, before returning to scanning their surroundings.</p><p>After they had broken apart, Alice fiddled with the pins he had handed her, watching after him as he moved a few steps away into the trees, his eyes sharp, his ears attentive. She blushed again as she considered his handsome features, idly imagining their hands bonded in betrothal in the same manner as her cousin’s and her intended’s had been, then sobering somewhat as she realized she didn’t even know this young man’s name. He had backtracked further into the woods, as if something had caught his eye, and she had no wish to disturb him from his watch, so, after putting the pins in her pocket, she retrieved her gloves, donned them again and moved on after the others.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>
  <em>I wrote this in October of 2016.</em>
</p></blockquote></div></div>
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